Where are the amazing people?
There are plenty of amazing people in our history – like Gandhi, Joan of Arc, Albert Einstein, William Shakespeare, Marie Curie, Ludwig van Beethoven, Buddha, Pablo Picasso and so many, many more.
One may aspire to such greatness and doing such positive impact on societies. But how do you go about achieving such greatness?
One of the most glaring outpoints I can see with Scientology is that no such people have been produced in or by Scientology.
Let me rush to the rescue of some readers emotional reaction by stating that I have had excellent gains in Scientology. This blog post is not about that, it is about the bigger picture. I have seen no person by the virtue of Scientology technology rise to the height of the men and women mentioned above. And I wonder why.
I also wonder if there is any current method that can give rise to such greatness.
Not that this greatness I am talking about is the only aspiration there can be. There is of course also the inner peace, the enjoyment of life, the zest of one’s adventures. And I can personally vouch for Scientology’s efficiency in these.
But the question remains: Where are the amazing people?
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Geir Isene: Straight talk on Scientology 
It is a critical question that you have asked. For churchers and independents alike, you will not make friends in both fields asking this question. Kudos for doing it. I think the reason to what you have asked is twofold.
I will not go into one reason, I guess you’ve heard the usual stuff coming from critics for the umpteenth time now and you know what the stance there is.
But I am going into a very important second reason that I believe plays a large part in this.
The original promise that people are getting into Scientology for is that they would learn easy-to-use tools that make them better and more able beings. However, my feeling in my research about the subject of Scientology is that there is not a “simple” and “easy to use toolbox” that one would be able to pick up quickly. Book one, Dianetics, claims there is and if it would have been left at that book I would agree. But all too often I have heard that “the tech was missapplied”, because one did not study and word clear properly. And after Dianetics, it goes on with Science of Survival. And Dianetics 80-08 etc. And the E-Meter is introduced. And learning how to operate an E-Meter properly is an entire book on its own. There is abundant material from Hubbard: There are so many courses to take, there are so many books to read, lectures to listen to, that honestly I don’t think you really get the time to excel at anything else than studying Hubbard scriptures and doing courses once you’re getting immersed in Scientology.
Add to that the fact how much the current organisation is calling on current members to make “sacrifices for the 3rd and 4th dynamic” and I think there is a pretty clear picture.
Mozart did not take charge off prenatal engrams when he practiced playing the piano and violin as a child. Picasso was not holding the cans when he rose to fame. And Einstein was certainly not trying to make ends meet in his swiss patent office in order to pay for the next course, but was working on his theories instead.
To become truely great, I do agree you need to be gifted. But that will rarely suffice. There are many gifted people on the world that never aspire to “greatness”. You need to practice. And without working on improving your skills, that other gifted concert piano player will just be better than you. And that is where the bar will be that you are measured by in terms of “greatness”.
Good post. Yes, skills need practice.
I am not a believer in Scientology. Let me make that clear for the outset. I repect your right to believe anything you wish though, so long as it does not harm anyone.
I firmly believe that greatness such as in some of the people you mentioned cannot be achieved by anything Scientology, nor any other practice, religion, or philosophy can offer. To put it simply; you’re born with it.
If anyone thinks that a practice such as Scientology can deliver such a thing to man, then you have been sold a lie. Where are the OTs? Where are the Clears? They exist in name only, written on a pretty looking certificate that is worthless in the real world. Just about all of the many, many promises of LRH never materialised. I apologise if that offends you Geir, I actually respect you a lot, but that’s the truth.
Well, that’s the truth according to you, so a “IMHO” may have served your post well, IMHO.
Now, it is obvious to me that some people do rise to the occasion through practicing skills that are not there from their birth. The examples are numerous. No-one is born a Kung Fu expert. So right there I believe your version of the truth is blown out of the water. Then, if it is possible to train to become a master of skills, then it follows that there could be practices that sharpens skills and produces or at least releases the mastery of people. The practice of Kung Fu training being one of about a million good examples.
I do respect your belief that certain things are impossible. But I do believe you have been sold that lie. IMHO.
I think Steven has a point. You have as well, it is true that you can practice skills that aren’t visible yet and get quite good.
But there are people that are born with certain gifts and thus become better than other people at a certain skill with less effort.
Lots of it certainly depends on the education you receive as a child, which in my view is most critical: it is the time in life when your brain is rewired in order to learn certain skills which is more difficult to achieve once you’re older. But even working with children as you as a father certainly know, there are some children that simply are faster learners than others. The reasons are diverse. I think it’s a combination of several factors.
To become truly great in a difficult to achieve skill I think all factors must meet: genetic properties, upbringing as a child and first and foremost: discipline.
If you skip any of those, except for rare cases, you have missed your opportunity to be among the greatest. I don’t think anything will ever change that.
My point being, to return back to the case of the concert pianist: you could become quite good to an ordingary citizen, but you would never in your life time be able to achieve the prowess of Cziffra, Martha Argerich or a Vladimir Horowitz on the piano. Even if you gave up work and spent the rest of your life at the piano.
Who knows? It is not a proven fact.
Anyway, I am not refuting what you write her. I refute what Steven wrote. There are a couple of miles from the one to the other.
We are both in the same position, Geir; neither of us has any proof, but IMHO, if you were to take a poll, the majority of people would support my opinion that people are born with “genius”. It can’t be taught, though it can be nurtured. There’s a world of difference between a masterfully trained musician, mathematician, physicist etc. and the real greats. They’re on another level completely. If you can’t see that then possibly you haven’t observed enough. I’m sure we’ll have to agree to disagree though 🙂
Well, my point is rather that anything is possible, though gradient scales of possibility applies. Ref. my article on free will.
Geir, I agree, anything is possible through gradient scales.
Our era however is very demanding in MEST terms and thetans tend to get mired into more and more MEST.
There are no groups who can form sane communities for people to act in there and create some stronger groups and members.
When we get together and build up some communities I think a lot of good people will excell.
All we have to do is to have a plan or rather several ones and work on those.
It can be on children and study tech, teachings about the spirit about other things, communication etc.
Of course it takes a thetan to develop things. So, let’s get together and work on some project(s).
Who knows? It is not a proven fact.
Anyway, I am not refuting what you write her. I refute what Steven wrote. There are a couple of miles from the one to the other.
Geir, I bow to you. You are amazing! But again, it is your merit, your excellence.
(You are not the final product of the factory.)
I am not final by any definition 🙂 I am developing along my journey.
Dear Geir, I gave this issue a lot of thought earlier. Here are my conclusions:
1) The focus in the current Church of Scientology is way too much on “handling” the so-called “case”.
I’m sure you have heard that phrase: “You get what you push.” It’s actually from an LRH Flag Order from the Mission School 2nd Class pack. It also says: “If you push case on post, you get case on post.”
What I have seen during the 10 years I spent in the Church that Registrars, EDs etc. were pushing the line that in order to survive at all you need to go up the Bridge to full OT. Kind of creating a dangerous environment with your reactive mind being a sinister and unknown source of potentially deadly problems until you fix yourself up with auditing.
There is a very interesting writing on this subject by Hubbard called “Accent on Ability” (Foundation Bulletin Vol 1 No 3 in 1954, in Red Vol II). He says it there: “We long ago discovered in Dianetics that what we validate comes true. Thus, if we continue to process or connect with or continue to harbor entheta, we discover that entheta becomes quite live. But if we decide to process on the theta line, validating such things as affinity, reality and good communication, we make short work out of the case. Here we have the difference between making a preclear well and making him sick. We can actually process a preclear in the direction of difficulty to such an extent that these difficulties, imagined or actual, become real. The validation of difficulty will always result in the accomplishment of difficulty. Similarly, the validation of ability will always accomplish ability.”
…
“Dianetics today is a Science of Ability. It has no traffic with psychosomatic
illness or aberration. It does not care a whit about these two things.”
IMHO, the subject and its Founder failed to follow up on this goal, and when back to the old approach.
1A) As a consequence, to the above, in all the Scientology organizations I worked, production problems were supposed to be handled by handling the minds of personnel exclusively. Not enough GI? The Reges should write up their O/Ws as it will open up the flows (a kind of magic). Stats not good? Let’s locate the condition of the group and handle that! Crashed stat? Let’s sec check you for crimes! No real expansion? Let’s get the crew co-auditing to handle their cases.
It was pretty rare to see lack of production solved by getting more actual work done instead of employing various “handlings”. This approach has a tendency to introvert staff and public alike so they spend more time with handling themselves than with actual work!
A good example is an OT V Hungarian public who decided to sell his house for 140% of the market price (that was the amount needed for him to do OT VI, VII and VIII). He read the article: “Considerations and mechanics” every day. Wrote up his whole track O/Ws on sales. Even got tailor made auditing on that subject. It was a subject of a tremendous amount of 2WC with Reges from all around the world. He did a lot of outflow as per HCO PL BASIC PRINCIPLE OF PROMOTION. After a 2 year struggle, he ran out of cash, was forced to lower the price to an acceptable level and sold it in one week.
2) The religious adherence to LRH writing (KSW all the way) and the ‘do what Ron says’-approach, lack of personal integrity, the militaristic and authoritarian Sea Org attitude.
To have a significant impact on Earth, one has to be able to seriously “think outside the box” and be inventive. The current Scientologist society is based on uniformity (who is the most standard, in-ethics, in-tech, in-everything guy?) and strict adherence to whatever LRH wrote on anything (example: LRH said we keep paper folders on all customers, so CRM software is a big no-no). This kills the kind of thinking great people do.
3) The current Bridge is mostly subjective auditing i.e. takes place in one’s mind. It does have a limited effectiveness, but IMHO it can only increase one’s potential for success and does not make one significantly more able in itself. Confessionals can make one feel relieved but that’s about what they do, not much more. The actual objective processes are limited to one single level and are not very much varied, and apparently are not researched fully.
4) Admin tech is supposed to be the key for success in life. It has many shortcomings unfortunately.
– The way statistics used is inherently broken, inevitably leading to the phenomenon called “stat push” and excessive micromanagement. LRH tried to mend it in HCO PL STAT PUSH and STAT PUSH CLARIFIED, but failed to spot the real Why: his own faulty and vague policies and certain HCO PLs that he wrote that directly encourage stat pushing and short-sighted planning.
– The technological advances (especially IT – CRM systems, workflow management software, networks, Internet etc.) are mostly neglected. LRH claimed that computers were used to run entire civilizations on the whole track, yet somehow failed to remember or foresee the inventions used today in ‘wog’ corporate management.
– Over 90% of the HCO PLs in theory. The practical tools provided are mostly designed for the Church which is ran as a kind of a paramilitary organization and pretty hard to adapt to a normal company. The resulting guilt for “not applying 100% standard tech”, mostly caused by WISE, does not help either.
– Separate Scientology terms were developed for existing concepts, which makes adaptation and integration of the method into a ‘wog’ environment pretty cumbersome and difficult. Like trying to introduce the finance planning tech, the first stumbling block is this: the FP is done by the AC, approved by EC; the final approval terminal is the FBO on the POs and EPOs 🙂 And then there is no HR Department, but Estos etc.
I hope it helps.
Great post (although a long one). Thanks for the LRH quote there; A very good one.
The handlings of situations on a via rather than directly addressing the situation itself is a key problem.
The geniuses you mention IMHO all had one thing in common: They wanted to do what they did, because it was in their heart and felt natural to them, and they had and/or developed the necessary skills.
Essentially however it is the urge within you, which you can not explain, and which drives you forward, until you realize that you are “different”. At that point you decide to become a conformist, living life along the generally accepted guidelines, or you risk being fully yourself despite the difficulties you will now face. Look at Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock. One a scientologist, the other not. Both are geniuses. Corea had it in him before scientology – he was discovered by Miles Davis.
The promises scientology made to you would appear to be more along the lines of a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you are good at what you do, they will support you, as it supports them. And it supports you. But not one poor scientologist will become a great concert pianist, just because he studies gradient scales and finds great wins in touching and letting go of a piano, let alone “remembering having been the concert pianist on the supreme rules space ship 55 millions years ago”.
Regarding the gains you speak of that came from Scientology: the simple truth is these gains don’t give you any major new abilities. Yes, they may make you understand some simple human behaviors better, and give you some skills to interact with others. Yes, your study skills may get better through word clearing, and you may understand something a bit better if you clay demo it. And mostly, you may “feel better” by going over something in auditing, and you might have some self realizations.
But these are small things in the scheme of things. Some of them, such as more “beingness” or “havingness” or whatever, count for nothing outside of Scientology or perhaps to yourself.
An even harder idea for you to consider: someone who follows Scientology may have far fewer critical thinking skills, or may lose them through their involvement. A scientist, for example, lives in a realm of doubting, questioning, and trying alternatives, the very things that essentially are frowned upon in Scientology. The Tech didn’t work? The only option acceptable is that it wasn’t applied correctly. The Tech didn’t work? What have YOU done? And so on. But any scientist would also include: maybe the Tech doesn’t work.
This is also why Scientology attracts disproportionately from artists, actors, musicians. Their skill set tends not to require critical analysis. Instead, they rely more on imagination (not that scientists don’t!) They are better suited to become Scientologists I believe.
As far as political leadership, my sense is that Scientology is a very egocentric exercise. You are trying to improve you. You want to have gains. If you want to do something for others, it is usually about getting them into Scientology or using Scientology to promote Scientology! That’s what I’ve seen at least.
You will note I have emphasized that you may actually get gains from Scientology. I’m just saying there is no reason to expect much from them except some personal satisfaction.
You ask, “Where are the amazing people?” I would rather ask, “What makes a person amazing?” and then compare the answers to what the tools in Scientology help one accomplish IN ACTUAL PRACTICE.
I think that amazing people have a tremendous confidence in themselves. They listen to everyone but follow there own advice. Does Scientology, actually, encourage one in this direction?
I think that amazing people are very focused in a self-generated cause. Does Scientology tools bring about such a focus in a self-generated cause.
I think that amazing people are not stuck in the idea of being amazing or great. In their enthusiasm for the game they love, they push their self (ego) aside. There is no desire to boost up their ego; like wanting to become so-and-so. In other words, their focus is not on BEING. How does Scientology measure up here?
I am not talking about what is written in Scientology materials. I am talking about the culture that we find Scientology generating as a sum total of all its efforts.
.
You are amazing.
HI Geir!!
I am now out and LOVING IT!! I just found out you were back to this format and I always liked this one better. I am in a hurry right now, but just wanted to say hi and see if you had seen my Indie announcement on Marty’s blog? I give you a lot of the credit for getting me to wake up.. ha ha.
ARC,
Tony DePhillips
I saw the announcement. Excellent.
Or how about this one… why is there no whole-track technology product or service?
Even with 10 Scientologist OT8’s with even a semblance of whole-track memory, one of these could produce a product that would make them billionaires, and as such, a center of economic stability that truly helps those around them. Parlor tricks OSA might say? In less than 2 years, a group of internet retards/heros have been able to bring a world-cult to its knees. It’s called survival at this point.
This is easily the most glaring and damning Scientology concept in existence.
I hope you take it far and wide. I hate religion but accept it for the stability it gives to the workforce. But as for cults? It manipulates and harms big thinkers who are uneducated. And as we see here with all the antagonism towards it… nature hates that.
I find this point much easier to digest – details of memory fade, even within one lifetime, even in a few years. So, if my skills are rusty after not using them for a couple of years, they will be pure Fe2O3 after a lifetime or two (let alone a million).
IIRC, LRH said OT VIII addressed to primary reason for amnesia on the whole track.
Yes. The reason for amnesia on the whole track. Nowhere have I seen that he said it handles the amnesia on the whole track.
IMHO, the whole track memory that would stick around would be of incomplete cycles of action (which is not as-ised yet). The memory of completed cycles of action would have long been as-ised and would not be found in the memory banks, but would only be expressed as ability. Ability requires imagination for its outlet.
This may explain your dilemma. Does Scientology encourage imagination?
.
hehe
Well, does it? Hmm…
I can only say that my imagination was boosted by Scientology. But it wasn’t encouraged.
The question which you have asked has fairly simple answers. First of all, Scientology and its forerunner Dianetics have only been around for 60 years and in less than one lifetime, it is doubtful if any self betterment movement would produce a giant such as Ghandi, Lincoln, Da Vinci or others whom you have named.
I admit that If Scientology had been around hundreds of years I doubt if even one such individual would arise from its ranks. There are several reasons for this. The reason is not the calibur of people who get into Scientology. many are extremely brilliant, rather the answer lies with the focus of the group. First and most simple, if a person is born of Scientology parents and raised in Scientology, the answers as to why no geniuses will develop is obvious. As children, they do not geta complete educations and learn basically only enough reading, writing and arithmetic to function on some type of job in Scientology and the bulk of their education is only in the works of L Ron Hubbard and not his most esoteric writings but usually only his writings on how to be a group member and how to carry out the duties of a job within the organization. Originality, brilliance, out of the box thinking is not encouraged but rather a total duplication of what Mr.Hubbard has written is preferred, even demanded. Their concept is that a team well trained in Mr. Hubbard’s teachings can get more good accomplished in this world than individuals trying to change the world on their own.
If you join up as an adult, here again, you are encouraged to study only Mr. Hubbard’s works. Some of Hubbard’s studies may well improve your abilities so that you can do better at your job or in raising your family. Some people do rise up within the ranks of their companies as a result of taking Scientology courses. However, there is a push to get you to come on board as a staff member and whether you join their staff, or you work in the outside world, they want your help and put pressure on you to devote your energies to pursuing thier goals which they feel brings more sanity to this planet thn any individual working alone.
That’s it in a nutshell. If Ghandi had been born into Scientology (had it existed then}. he would not have had an opportunity to become Ghandi. Probably he would have been trained to do a Scientology job, done it well and then moved up within Scientology Management.
If he had come to them as a young adult, he may have benefitted from their courses but rather than start his own movement to free India, he very likely would have been encouraged to join their staff and improve world conditions by being a part of their team rather than doing it freelance.
Basically they are taught that everything worthwhile has already been discovered by L Ron Hubbard and while reading other authors might be interesting, their time is better served by reading Mr. Hubbard’s works and applying them to world conditions as part of their group. With this type of set up, you may have a lot of brilliant people come through your doors, and they do. Many of them enhance their abilities within Scientology but you are not going to see great individuals within the group arise and launch their own movements. Instead the best and brightest of them will attempt to better world conditions as a member, working should to shoulder with other members, learning Mr. Hubbard’s teachings and AS A GROUP applying them out in the world.
Gary
Wall of text. But a good post 🙂
To deferentiate Scientology from other religions, let me explain my own religious experience.
I consider myself a devout Jew. I practice Jewish law and pray every day. Nonetheless, I understand that the G-d I believe in is Himself not a scientific proven fact, and in fact there are many good arguments against His existence. As someone who was raised with both religious and secular educations, I understand that the effect of religion is for the most part psychological. The idea of an almighty being ruling the universe and looking out for us gives us comfort and meaning. It helps us strive to be better people and to inspire others to do better.
Religions make promises; that’s why people stay in them. For some religions, the promise is afterlife-related (heaven or hell, a better reincarnation, etc) and therefore not scientifically provable or disprovable. For others, the promise is happiness in this life, something many people have found but to most of us remains elusive.
I do not, however, believe that my life is going to be perfect because I am religious. It’s very clear to me that the cause-and-effect universe which we live in doles out pleasure and punishment regardless of one’s devotion to their chosen faith. When people suffer, it causes them to question their faith, but people who chose to remain religious understand that, well, life is short and then you die. HOW you live your life and WHY you choose to do so is more important.
I do not believe that if I prayed really, really hard, G-d (whose name is too holy to be written except on sacred paper) would send me a flying unicorn and have it land on my porch. OK, to be fair, I believe it’s unlikely – I’m 99.999999999% sure it’s not going to happen. It’s not worth trying. My faith causes me to believe that maybe there’s a chance it could, but let’s be realistic here.
At no point in my upbringing was I promised that I would, as a result of being devout, have things happen to me which are scientifically impossible. If I had been promised that, I would have become an atheist a long time ago. Imagine if a Rabbi had said to me, “Shalom, when you turn 13, you will learn how to fly, but only if you’re very devout.” If I then turned 13, and didn’t learn how to fly, and also found out that NO ONE in the history of man had ever done so, I would recognize the rabbi’s words for what they were: horseshit.
In my encounters with Scientologists, the message is clear: Read Dianetics, study Scientology, and you will be Clear. You will have perfect health, perfect vision, perfect memory, have a much higher IQ, and be able to move matter with your mind.
I have never, EVER seen any evidence to back that up. I once read a story of a Scientologist who claimed he moved a TV with his mind, but he didn’t do it in front of any witnesses, and the mind is an amazing thing – you can convince yourself of almost anything.
Even L Ron Hubbard wasn’t Clear. If he WROTE how to be clear, shouldn’t he have been a Clear? That’s like Buddha saying, “I’m not Enlightened, but you can achieve Enlightenment, which I’ve never achieved and will not achieve in my lifetime, by buying a lot of my books. And then, at times when I need more money, re-buying them.”
I have said many times that if Scientology produced one Clear, I would hop on that bandwagon. A lot of people I know have said that. Hell, I think EVERYONE would join Scientology if they saw a Clear flying down Times Square. It woudl be the best recruitment tactic ever! “We can move time and space with our minds – and we can show it to you! Right now! In public! In front of actual scientists!”
And yet, no Clears. Don’t make promises you can’t keep, and think hard to a system you subscribe to that continually does that.
Thanks for the post and insight into your own religious views.
There are Clears. Many. But not according to the original definition (total recall etc.) – that was way too optimistic. But Clears do exist as long as you understand the basis of the definition.
I thought Scientology was based on L Ron Hubbard’s teachings, and Hubbard believed in the Clears I’ve described. So are you redefining Scientology down from what its creator described it as being able to do?
Hubbard did try to produce a real Clear in front of an audience, and was laughed out of the room, I believe. It was in the 1970’s and involved an old woman?
He revised his ideas about a Clear several times. Scientology was a work in progress until he died.
Physicists were wrong in the early days. We don’t damn the subject of physics because of it.
I would be interested to know how much you revised down “Clear” and what else, particularly the tone scale. I mean, I’m clearly below 2.0 on the tone scale (I’m not a Scientologist, and I argue with the texts of it) but the Science of Life says that I should be eradicated silently and without regret. I assume that’s also a no-go?
What is a go, precisely?
It’s not my revision of Clear, it’s Hubbard’s own revisions I am talking about.
As for your position on the tone scale: That you are an inquisitive person questioning the subject certainly is no indication of you being low on the scale. And the quote that person’s low on the scale should be disposed of silently and without sorrow is IMO plainly wrong.
A go is whatever you deem is right. Scientology is a very large set of tools. Use what is right for the right situation.
I would be interested in reading the materials where Hubbard revised his vision of Clear, as I’ve only heard the 200 IQ/perfect memory/you can move stuff with your mind version over and over again.
Right. It becomes a broken record of the critics.
Little time – I will have to ask the other readers of this forum to provide the material. Hey Other, can you provide?
Thanks Geir. Good one. Why were those mentioned amazing? Maybe because they were not suppressed in their minds or in their hearts. Perhaps because they were allowed to think in a free way and discover what worked and what did not work. Maybe because they were allowed to laugh and cry and feel. Perhaps because they felt free to try.
Freedom produces amazing results. I hope we can all work toward more personal freedom in our thoughts and actions.
Many amazing things have been done by many amazing people. We just do not know their names.
Since I have never been a Scientologist, it’s been much easier for me to look at it from a critical viewpoint. I remember faintly stumbling upon a critical website many years ago, but then forgetting about it for a while until Scientology was in the news. But even still I couldn’t believe some of the actual criticism I heard about it until I did some more research.
In my own observations, Scientology seems like something that makes a lot of empty promises (as mentioned before), even though there might be SOME things that can help someone out. A lot of the exes who mention the courses that they felt were beneficial, is mainly from the material that Hubbard borrowed from others before him. Hell, even the word “Scientology” (Scientologie) came from an old book written in the 30s that never saw the light of the mainstream.
But I think the one thing that gets to me about Scientology, that I see very few talk about, is that the short period of time after the launch of Dianetics & Scientology, Hubbard didn’t even call it a religion, and in fact passed himself off as a scientist who had discovered a new science of the mind. It wasn’t until he was criticized by doctors and scientists, and had the lingering threat of being shut down by the government, that he decided it to be a religion. I believe, that if not for that, Scientology would not have lasted as long as it did. Feel free to disagree with me, but that’s just what I see when looking in from the outside.
A somewhat rubber-stamped critic response if I may say so. It includes the usual “anything good is borrowed from others” and the “empty promises”. It’s easy as you say to criticize something from the outside. Lack of personal gains from the subject will obviously contribute to that. As for the move to labeling Scientology a religion, the history is a bit different than what you describe (past lives kept coming up in sessions, making the human spirit an obvious part of the subject). However, I believe it was a mistake to label it a religion. I see it is a large set of tools to be used for the right situations.
If you consider the examples Geir uses, they are all people who have questioned the authorities in their respective fields. People who have challenged the orthodox thinking with new ideas and solutions to old problems. In Scientology, such thoughts are considered heresy and stomped on without remorse. Nothing new can ever come from Scientology. The tech is set.
The better question to ask would be: what individualities and how many new ideas to shape a better world have been extinguished by Scientology.
“If you consider the examples Geir uses, they are all people who have questioned the authorities in their respective fields. People who have challenged the orthodox thinking with new ideas and solutions to old problems. In Scientology, such thoughts are considered heresy and stomped on without remorse. Nothing new can ever come from Scientology. The tech is set.”
BLiP, this is a third aspect I haven’t thought about in my response. You are absolutely right with this. Back in 1900 the established physicists were sure the world was deterministic, and the laws of mechanics were cast in stone as set forth by Newton. Boltzman committed suicide over his theories of entropy not being accepted even though he later turned out to be right. And it took Einstein to go against the flow and challenging Newton’s mechanics to develop his theories.
Not to forget Niels Bohr.
The great leaders you mention above all took what worked for them and ran with it, independently.
After the independent movement in Scientology has had enough time to de-brainwash people, you may find a few of them rising to the heights of legend.
Nice point. And I hope you are right.
I think some people here judge Scientology too hard instead of judging this very society that has produced jeniuses and monsters alike.
Scientology is too young to be judged. And of course Scientology is not the CofM not even LRH.
Scientology is a body of data to be studied by anyone.
And has produced far better (even if not stellar or amazing people as Geir asks) people than this society as a whole.
After 500 years we can judge Scientology better and what it produced. If there is going to be any Scientology with all this fanaticism. It’s just data and procedures. Leading one to an awareness of being a spirit. A world will be better if people knew they were spirits. With all the suppression from one worlders Scientology gets suppressed, too.
Geir it’s up to us in Europe to create something bigger. I thank you for doing what you are doing. I will keep an eye on that and the trick is to get people together and launch projects where each one can take part.
We can do that even via the web. What is missing is Direction. A lot more will be done then. And for those who just criticize I can tell them that Scientologists have questioned a lot already. It’s another thing if they have been turned into passive spectators. That was not the purpose, so stay tuned as this is changing right now. More and more come out and speak.
Would you like to know Yourselves? Well find out. It takes guts and persistence. We have attained the first step. Maybe we are not amazing people but the amazing thing is that we know who we(you) are. A Spirit. Wow, how radical!! What a society!
Now here’s a good response from A Random Guy™ that I found Somewhere On The Net®:
“I’d never thought I’d defend scientology, but here’s a thing to remember:
When Isene mention “Great people” he mention 9 examples. If you expand that group with noteworthy people with equal achievements (Bohr, Mandela, Vivaldi, Newton, Nightingale, Bach, Darwin, Freud, Brahms are names that comes to mind), you may end up with perhaps 200 names, gathered from the last millennium or so. If you add all Nobel prize winners, we may have about 1000 names. Now, how many people have lived from 1000 AD until today? How many of all these billions of people have been “grat people” in the sense we here are talking?
If we assume the total number of humans to have lived from 1000 AD to present to be 7 billion, and the number of “great peolpe” to have been around 1000, the chance for being a “great person” is 1/7.000.000. With a total number of scientologists since Hubbard started being perhaps half a million, the chance that there should be a “great person” among them is fairly slim.
So, purely based on numbers and the strict criteria suggested by Isene, there’s very little chance that “great people” should happen to be scientologists.”
BTW (in relation to the Random Guy’s estimate: According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_population):
“Estimates of ‘the total number of people who have ever lived’ published in the 2000s range approximately from 100 to 115 billion”
Perhaps a better question to all of this would be “Why do we, as a people, rely so heavily on great leaders to ‘fix’ us or lead us to ‘heaven’?”
Why are we so weak, individually, that we can’t just BE in our own “heaven”?
Why do we need papa-Miscavige. Or papa-LRH for that matter?
From what I can see, the highest-trained, highest-stat people were wiped out by DM around the time of the Mission Holder’s conference in the early 1980’s.
DM wiped out the most ethical, most productive, best trained people in Scientology. He did it when he was 22 years old! With ease!
So to hell with leaders.
Why can’t we just rely upon ourselves?
Right!
as you have said, not a single one of those people were Scientologists. Yet they achieved greatness without help of your religion. And so far I have yet to see anyone from your religion enter into greatness, so maybe your belief system is the antithesis to achieve greatness?
It could be.
In the interest of finding the truth, one would of course explore all possible explanations, don’t you agree?
Isene, is it any wonder why you ( and others ) have asked this when we have been indoctrinated to believe that so many supernatural abilities were to be gained in our travels up the bridge?
[link removed due to reference to upper level confidential material]
When a person leaves Scientology, he or comes out with a tremendous amount of ideas that have since been reviewed and reconsidered by those who have left before him or her.
Educating oneself by looking over what is available on the internet has proven to be a major key to understanding what one was involved in and what one needs to reconsider, keep or discard. Questioning things is a part of the provess of sifting the wheat from the chaff.
You are a bright man with a heart of gold and a mind that seeks truth. That you share this with others because you care is a testament to your integrity and humility. Keep learning and questioning and sharing.
Mary
Will do.
It seems to me that there is a pervasive, often unstated viewpoint in the Church of Scientology culture that “human” endeavor is unimportant (already been there, done that over countless lifetimes) and is only worthwhile if it contributes to the forward motion of undoing the dwindling spiral. Therefore efforts to be great are somehow “out ethics” for they forward the game (the dwindling spiral) rather than focus on unmocking or undoing it unless the “greatness” forwards the purposes of Scientology. I was even told about a reference that art is unethical because it makes people feel okay about their existence i.e. kind of like an opiate for the masses.
Great input. And yes, this is my experience too.
If it is somewhat unethical to play a game one is happy to play because we have to undo the aberrations that keeps us from happily playing a game… then that would earn an F in the logic’s class.
What contibutes to the forward motion of undoing the dwindling spiral is introducing simplicity that replaces existing complexity. So, there is lot of original creativity possible.
It is not just like uncompressing a compressed spring. It can be replacing the compressed spring with an entirely different but simple and more workable mechanism.
.
Amen.
What is this idea of a “dwindling spiral”? Don’t you think that the world in general is better off today than it was three hundred years ago? People need less time to work for a loaf of bred than back then, since the end of World War II Europe (except Yugoslaviaa area) has enjoyed the longest time period of peace, etc. People live a lot longer today than back then, medicine is a much more advanced than back then, etc. — One does not need a negative to promote a positive. If one does, then the positive is nothing but an echo of the other. And who needs an echo?
I agree – even though there are some aspects that are less positive now than before (family relations in the Western world being one)
What is IMHO?
In My Humble Opinion.
Do you ever wonder about the existence/availability of OT IX and X?
I do. I pretty much know what it should be – but I have also reasons to suspect they will never be released.
dear Geir,
from my POV, the simplicity of where they are is – suppressed and held down.
Those that have the spark that is high beingness (OT) found themselves the unwitting effect of the very tech that could have granted them that expansiveness that is true OT reach.
Because the waters were sullied (alter-ised tech/ unfinished tech) it was easy at the end of LRH’s days to sway him and ingratiate oneself (DM) and manage the power commlines DM found himself on.
Come down through the years to PT and you find the amazing people you seek suppressed and self invalidating with wrong ethics whys – forevermore held in perpetuity that is the vicious cycle of PTSness unseen.
Being that the majority of the rest of the sheep are just that – sheep – amazing people stay cowed under the trance that true SPs can wield upon the weak minded.
We are awakening now. More and more of us. Shucking the veils of the lies of DM and his ilk.
I’ve chosen the red pill from the outset – as have you, as have all of us seeing the isness now.
Geir, The Amazing People are here amongst you. A mere stones throw away across the interwebs.
The time is upon us. The game is on.
Amazing People as one!
arc,
freescn.com
Thank you for bringing this discussion up.
While I believe the the tools of Scn are quite capable of making an amazing person, the following should be considered:
1. The culture of the church tends to frown on getting too creative. You are supposed to just do what the church wants you to do. This creates a conflict with OTs particularly.
2. Scientology should be viewed by how much it increased the potential of individuals. What would the person have been without scientology vs. with? There is no way to measure this because there is no way to set up an experiment with a control or placebo vs. one exposed to scientology. You can’t split the individual in two to do this. Thus one has to rely on personal accounts. AND though there are plenty of success stories, there are ALSO plenty of horror stories.
What do you think of Dennis Stephens “Trom” (The Resolution of Mind.)?
I don’t have an opinion yet as I haven’t looked much into it. I will, though.
I understand your OPQuestion and you ask a valid question in one sense.
In another sense it sets up an arbitrary frame of reference for judging “amazing.” Amazed and amazing for me say something something too about the observer. A more able person is more easily amazed by things that others do not find amazing.
The geniuses that you mention in the OP were easily amazed.